2008-2013

Thanks to everyone who came along to Abbey Gardens on a
swelteringly hot Saturday afternoon, I really enjoyed the
discussion and meeting folk with perspectives on shared gardens
from so many different countires.

In her book 'The Porridge Quarrel – Ecology and Gender in the
History of Food Cultures' Elisabeth describes a number of
emancipatory movements which have shaped
the way we eat and serve food collectively. From the shift of
eating warm porridge to white bread, French post-revolutionary
dinner tables, vegetarianism at the end of
the 19th century and a social history of public houses.

'What Will the Harvest Be' is a community harvest garden built
on a formerly derelict site at Abbey Gardens in Newham. The
influences behind the project relate back to the original
Cistercian Abbey where monks used the land as a site of great
productivity. The intriguing 'Plaistow Landgrabbers' also inspired
the artists and provided the project title.

Elisabeth and Nina are going to informally talk about these
different movements and histories and relate them to current
community garden initiatives and politics.

Elisabeth Meyer-Renschhausen is a Berlin based social historian
and garden activist.
Her research and writing includes gender studies with a focus on
rural women and small holdings, food histories related to social
and emancipatory movements, peasant movements and globalised
agriculture. She is currently involved in the 'Allmende-Kontor' an urban
gardening and networking project in Berlin.

Nina Pope together with Karen Guthrie are the artist/film-maker
group Somewhere, who initiate and produce collaborative,
multi-disciplinary projects. Following the initiative by the
'Friends of Abbey Gardens', to make the derelict site open for
public use, 'Somewhere' as the invited artist team proposed a
public-access 'harvest garden' of fruit, flowers and vegetables
that literally anyone can use: 'What Will the Harvest Be'. The
garden was launched in 2009 and is now run by the 'Friends of Abbey
Gardens'.